| Summary/Abstract |
Sub-Saharan Africa's electrification rate of 45% in 2018 remains extremely low compared with other developing regions. This study investigates if foreign capital could significantly contribute to enhancing the electricity access rate in Africa, a subject so far neglected in the literature. Specifically, it seeks to know whether increasing FDI, remittances and foreign aid matter for access to electricity in Africa. We utilize a dynamic panel System-Generalized Method of Moments (Sys-GMM) estimator to analyse data collected on a panel of 36 African countries over 2000–2017. The empirical findings show that FDI and remittances are positively and significantly related to increasing access to electricity. Moreover, our results show that foreign aid reduces the electricity access. We finally find that remittances reduce urban-rural disparities in access to electricity, while FDI and foreign aid increase disparities. These results remain consistent when we perform sub-regional analyses, suggesting that African countries should rely more on remittances and FDI to promote universal access to electricity.
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